American Go E-Journal » 2008 » November

Canadian teenager Gan Sheng Shi (left) defeated both Mingjiu Jiang and Huiren Yang last weekend to earn a berth in the North American Fujitsu Cup championship final against Jie Li. The excitement continued Sunday when the final had to be adjourned because of technical difficulties. It was excitement on all fronts during the North American Fujitsu Cup championship. While top seeds Jie Li, Andy Liu and Huiren Yang made it through unscathed to the semi-finals, defending champion Mingjiu Jiang let a favourable position evaporate when he lost on time to Redmond Cup champion Gan Sheng Shi. The Canadian teenager then astonished a crowd of 500 by taking down professional Huiren Yang to earn a spot in the finals against perennial strongman Jie Li. The excitement continued when Jie Li suffered network problems at move 55 of the final game and could not reconnect to continue. The game has been adjourned and will be rescheduled at a later date. Click here for complete details on the tournament so far.– Philip Waldron, AGA Tournament Coordinator

Dae Hyuk (Danny) Ko (right) 7D (AGA 8.712) took first place in the Myung In Tournament, held November 15-16 in Los Angeles, CA. The Los Angeles Go Club, a popular 7-day playing spot in LA’s Koreatown, hosted the tournament, which was organized by the newly-formed Korean American Baduk Association. About 50 players, including a number from outside the Korean community, played in two handicap sections and one open section for $4,000 in prizes, won by Ko, of the Santa Monica Go Club. The tournament also featured an exhibition game between two Southern California professionals, Myung Wan Kim 8P and Yilun Yang 7P. “Sunday evening dinner was provided to all the players,” reports Andy Okun, “and there was a raffle of donated goods as well, in which your correspondent unexpectedly won 40 pounds of rice.” Korean American Baduk Association officials plan to hold more events in the coming year.

Trevor Morris (left) 7D swept the Western Massachusetts Go Club’s Fall tournament, held November 23 in Boston. Morris was undefeated in four rounds to claim the first-place trophy, while three players had 3 wins each: Eric Osman 2d (3-1), Richard Buckman 7k (3-1) and William Luff 10k (3-1). Click here for a full report, including photos by Bill Saltman.

Cho U 9P took the second game of his challenge for the Tengen title held by Kono Rin 9P to make the score 2-0 in the best-of-five-game match. Kono, who has held this title for the last three years, defeating Yamashita Keigo 9P in the title match each year, will have a hard fight to make it four. Cho’s winning percentage so far this year is 79%, while Kono’s is 60%, so the odds favor Cho’s taking another of the top seven Japanese titles — he already holds the Meijin and Gosei.

Korean Kang Dongyun (right) 8P snapped Chinese teen Tuo Jiaxi 3P’s winning streak in the international Nongshim Cup, winning by 1.5 points Monday. Tuo, got the Chinese team off to a blazing start in the Nongshim team tournament by winning all four games in the first stage and eliminating two members of the Korean and the Japanese teams, lost in the first round of the second stage on Monday, November 24th to Korean Kang Dongyun 8P (another teen) by 1.5 points. There will be six games in this stage, which is being played in Pusan, Korea, one each day until November 29th. Coincidentally, the first Chinese player in the similar Jeongganjang Cup for women also won all four of the games in the first stage earlier this month. Song Ronghui 1P, yet another teen, will face a Korean player when that event resumes in early January. Photo from the World Go new blog

Kobayashi Koichi (left) 9P is one of the most popular pros of what is now the older generation in Japan. Though in his fifties, Kobayashi is still active, and won two titles as recently as 2004, though he rarely reaches the later sections of tournaments now. However, by defeating Shuto Shun 6P on Saturday November 22nd, he has reached the finals of the Daiwa Cup where he will face Kono Rin 9P and current Tengen. The Daiwa Cup is a fast-play event on the Internet and one of three events sponsored by the Daiwa Securities Company of Japan; the others are the Daiwa Ladies Cup, won back in September by Xie Yimin 3P, and the Daiwa Grand Champion Cup, won by Iyama Yuta 8P last July.

There’s just over a month left to apply for an exciting new go study program in Korea. Applications for The King’s Baduk Academy are due by December 31. Applicants must be between the ages of 10 and 25; There will be 10 fully-funded positions — including paid travel, room and board, and tuition — one for each country, and 50 self-paying positions. Those selected will join a class of fifty other promising young players from around the world for a 3-7-year rigorous course of study starting in March 2009. Contact both president@usgo.org and igf@usgo.org for more information.

Princeton Go Club member Larry Bartels‘ (left) “Unequal Democracy” is among the books that President-Elect Barack Obama has read recently, according to the New Yorker magazine’s November 17 edition. In the book, Bartels argues that the causes of inequality are essentially political, “an insight that suggests that Obama might use economic policy to begin reversing a decades-long trend,” writes George Packer. Is this our best chance yet for a go-playing President?

A set of 200 Go Puzzles for Beginners, Oliver Richman’s River Mountain Go Curriculum and Go For Kids author Milton Bradley’s new Improve Fast In Go website are among several new materials The American Go Foundation is making available to go teachers on the AGA’s Methods page, where numerous other curricula and materials are already available. The AGF recently learned of the existence of the Go Puzzles, developed by Paul Smith for the British Go Association, which also publishes numerous materials for teachers. The new links expand the range of materials for use in a classroom or after-school setting. “The AGF is doing more than ever to support go in the classroom and in after-school settings,” says AGF Board member Roy Laird. “More than 70 active go teachers responded to our recent annual program survey, exactly double the number that responded last year. Among them they’re reaching a total of nearly 1000 new players this year. We hope these materials and other new AGF programs, like our new Teacher Store, will help them to do even more. They are leading the way to our next generation of players.” Photo: Six-year-olds play go on a hand-made go board at the Peninsula School, a progressive school in Menlo Park, CA; photo by Christopher Manning.

I’m glad so many of you appreciated the irony of Takemiya “Cosmic Go” Masaki being unable to challenge for the Tengen (center point) title. Peter Schumer provides the details -“Takemiya has held the Meijin, Honinbo and Judan titles. In addition he has challenged for the Kisei as well as the Oza and Gosei. But he’s never made the finals of the Tengen title”. Congrats to Boris Bernadsky, this week’s winner, selected at random from those answering correctly. THIS WEEK’S QUIZ: “I like (last week’s) question,” writes Kim Salamony, “but I think I will need some harder ones if I am going to catch (Quiz leader) Phil Waldron.” In honor of the ongoing debate over the Big 3 Bailout, maybe this automotive question will shake up the Quiz leaders as well – although the answer is not necessarily limited to an American-made car. There is (or was) one model or brand name of car that is a perfect anagram for one of the names for the game we all love. I will give you a hint – it is not “Go”, but one of the other Asian inspired equivalents. What car name am I looking for? Click here for your best guess.– Keith Arnold